


Aftermath

by AlphaStarwell



Category: Doctor Strange (2016)
Genre: Drama, F/M, Lost in space - Freeform, Stranded, alien realm
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-07
Updated: 2018-07-07
Packaged: 2019-05-19 10:12:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 9,118
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14871801
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlphaStarwell/pseuds/AlphaStarwell
Summary: Soon after Strange's successful bargaining with Dormammu, he finds that the entity from the Dark Dimension left an unpleasant surprise. He took his followers and left the Earth alone, but there was still a price.





	1. Chapter 1

_ “Dormammu, I’ve come to bargain.” _

 

It had only been two weeks since Dr. Strange had made a bargain with the god of the Dark Dimension. Yet that moment still haunted his dreams, each and every night.

 

_ “Dormammu, I’ve got to bargain.” _

 

Each time his own voice repeated those words inside his mind, it was followed by one of the many terrible things that followed his bold, stubborn statement. While it was all a blur now, and some of it was already fading from his memory, he could still remember the pain that occurred over and over.

 

Sometimes it had been a quick death where he was completely obliterated by raw energy, other times he was smashed into a pulp of shattered bone and tissues, other times his vital organs were pierced or torn. 

 

That entire experience, which had gone on for only God knew how long, had to be the closest thing a living soul could compare to Hell. Eternal torment, where you faced the agonizing destruction of your own body over and over just to have it restored in order to face more of the same.

 

Perhaps Dormammu was a devil and, in a way, the Dark Dimension was Hell. The only thing that allowed Strange to escape intact, with assurance that the Earth would be left alone, was the fact that he himself had created the small pocket of Hell that trapped him with the god-like being.

 

Dormammu had had little exposure to the phenomenon known as Time, a thing of which any human was aware. Both Strange and the huge entity had experienced something they were unaccomstomed to; Dormammu had never dealt with Time before, but Strange had never dealt with repeating time loops before.

 

In a lot of ways, Strange had privately considered much later the many things that he could have done with the green Infinity Stone. If he really wanted to, he could have attempted to go back in time and prevent the car accident that damaged his hands. That would be a significant loss and very damaging to the timeline, however; it had been he who restored the Sanctum that Dormammu’s followers had destroyed, plus… it had be none other than Strange himself who convinced the entity to leave Earth alone for good.

 

But why did it seem like… there was something very important, very significant, that he was currently overlooking?

 

_ “Dormammu, I’ve come to bargain.” _

 

While he was trying to rest, to ease his mind and meditate before going to bed that evening, it seemed almost as though there was  _ something _ his mind was trying to tell him. It was as if his brain had stored some kind of minute detail that was easily overlooked, particularly through the pain, shock and moderate trauma that the entity put him through during that vicious cycle.

 

_ “Dormammu, I’ve come to bargain…” _

 

There was  _ something _ else there, something that his brain seemed to be trying to recall. It was like the feeling of an old, suppressed childhood memory that wouldn’t take shape. It was like the song that repeated itself in your head, but the name or the lyrics wouldn’t come. It was like trying to think of that one, perfect word you needed to finish a sentence and, while it was on the tip of your tongue, it just wouldn’t come to you.

 

It was really starting to drive him crazy… it had been driving him nuts for two weeks now.

 

_ “Dormammu, I’ve come to bargain…” _

 

He stood and began to pace through the hallway. His brisk walking ultimately lead him outside, where he walked down the sidewalk, mildly aware of the cool city breeze tickling his facial hairs and the back of his neck.

 

While he was momentarily distracted by a loud car horn and screeching tires, causing his head to turn just in time to witness a would-be collision that was prevented by swerving and brakes, something else came to him. His senses momentarily dulled as the distraction in the street proved to be just enough to stop his mind from focusing so intently on what his brain was trying to tell him, that it finally came to him. Apparently, taking his mind off it for a split second was enough to jog his mind.

 

_ “Dormammu, I’ve come to bargain…” _

 

He couldn’t recall which of the many, many cycles the next words happened during. It could have been the first, it could have been the fifteenth, it could have been the last. 

 

Nevertheless… what followed did send chills down his spine.

 

_ “I see more in you than you know. If you leave here, I will leave something in my wake.” _

 

The rest of the dialogue seemed fuzzy… perhaps it was because it had been uttered just as his own skull had been smashed to smithereens. Nevertheless, he remembered a fragment of it… something that was just enough to put him on high alert.

 

It had been a vague yet apparently intentional promise.

 

Dormammu had indicated that, if Strange had returned to Earth in good health and if Dormammu himself didn’t get what he wanted… someone would suffer, no matter what the terms of the outcome was.

 

Dormammu had taken his followers and closed off the Dark Dimension enough so that Earth was no longer in danger of being pulled into it, and the god had also kept his word that he wouldn’t bother Earth again.

 

But apparently, there was a little piece of hell that he did leave behind as a form of revenge.

  
“Christine,” Strange uttered aloud urgently, suddenly remembering something. At least, he was  _ starting _ to remember something. He just knew he needed to check on her.  _ NOW. _


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

 

Dr. Christine Palmer blew a stray lock of hair out of her face as she entered one of the scrubbing areas. She always made it a habit to brush her hair and pin it up tight, but sometimes it had a way of coming loose by the end of the shift.

 

Particularly on a day like today, when it seemed like everything that could possibly go wrong did.

 

For one thing, it seemed like every fruitcake off the street with a drug problem had come in complaining of overdose, every short-tempered biker thug had come in with broken bones and lacerations, and every pregnant woman apparently had to give birth at the same time today.

 

She was a medical professional through and through, which gave her nerves of steel to get through any kind of crisis situation on most days. Today, however, was one of those rare exceptions where she’d been slammed so much, to the point where she’d been forced to deal with three crises at once several times, that she felt close to burnout.

 

What she needed most right now was for the final hour of her shift to pass with little or preferably no stress. Then she  _ needed _ to go home, unwind with Netflix and a simple microwaved dinner, and just decompress.

 

The last thing she needed right now, even if a small part of her subconsciously half-expected it these days, was a familiar voice calling her name.

 

“Christine!”

 

_ Great. _ If he was bringing an emergency, she would have to deal with it as her job required. She had an obligation to help save any human life anyway, but… everyone, especially doctors sometimes, at their limits.  _ Why does everyone want me to be Super Woman today? _ She groaned inwardly. 

 

On a normal day, she would have turned to face him after only a moment’s hesitation. Today, she continued to stand over the basin and stared at the water that flowed over her hands, uncharacteristically delaying the inevitable for as long as possible.

 

“Christine!” She yelped when Stephen appeared right beside her, touching her shoulder. “Are you alright?”

 

“You just startled me,” she breathed. She frowned up at him, noting a look of urgency on his face, yet she didn’t see anyone else. He also appeared to be uninjured, with that creepy cape or whatever it was draped over his shoulders like usual. “What’s going on? Is something wrong?”

 

Strange was still looking at her intently, as though trying to perform a brief physical on her with his eyes. “How are you feeling?”

 

“I feel fine, it’s just been a  _ long _ day,” Christine told him, then her brow furrowed. “Why are you looking at me like you think I’m gonna keel over?”

 

“Because I’m not sure what is going to happen to you,” Strange told her. 

 

She scrutinized his features, noting the lines of worry in his face and how intently his eyes were still looking her over. Whatever was happening, it was definitely no joke. At least he didn’t feel it was.

 

“Look, Stephen, I need to finish my shift,” she told him. “Can this wait until after--”

 

That’s when  _ something _ happened.

 

Strange caught her before she hit the floor, but she was unconscious before his hands ever reached her.

 

“Christine?” Her eyes were closed and, while she was still breathing, she wasn’t responding.

 

He had a hunch that this was something that a regular hospital couldn’t help with, so he hoisted her up to take her back to the supply closet where he’d left the portal open. He would need to give her an examination that was both medical and mystical.

 

As he stepped through the portal, he prayed silently that she would be okay.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

 

Strange knew that something was very wrong even before he finished stepping through the portal. He had distinctly formed the portal to take him and Christine back to the Inner Sanctum, but…  _ this _ place definitely wasn’t it.

 

His Cloak whipped around his body as a harsh wind blew around him, frequently changing direction. The sky above his head was so dark it almost seemed there was nothing but a sea of inky blackness up there. The temperature was fairly mild, if a bit on the warm side; the wind felt a tad like hot breath against his skin.

 

He immediately turned to step back through the portal, hoping to retrace his steps, but it was too late. It had already disappeared, having expired. He glanced down briefly at Christine’s unconscious form in his arms and, murmuring softly to her, he gently set her down on the ground, laying her out flat. The area seemed to be covered in rock in all directions, but at least it wasn’t very jagged. It wouldn’t be the most comfortable thing to lay on, but it wouldn’t hurt her.

 

After waiting a few seconds for a moment when the wind died down a tad, he raised his hands to create a new portal. However, instead of orange light forming a circular “hole” into the place he wanted to go, mere sparks and wisps of magic flicked from his fingers, just to fall to the ground and dissipate. 

 

“No…” Gritting his teeth, he raised his hands and tried again, putting more effort into it. His magic just didn’t seem to be working here, wherever  _ here _ was. 

 

There was no doubt in his mind that Dormammu had something to do with this, along with Christine’s condition.

 

After failing a third attempt to make a portal, he dropped to his knees beside Christine’s still form and leaned over her. “Christine, can you hear me?” He pressed his fingers briefly against her throat to check her pulse, then checked her eyes. Normal enough, along with her color; she was not pale nor was she feverish or cold and clammy.

 

For all intents and purposes, she just appeared to be sleeping.

 

He bent lower, putting his ear against her chest to try and detect her heartbeat in lieu of a stethoscope. From what he could deduce, well… at least it was beating.

 

“Christine, can you hear me?” He put his hands on her cheeks. “Christine, wake up!” He patted her face, hoping to make her stir. There was no response. 

 

If the situation hadn’t been so dire and if his nerves weren’t on edge with worry, he might have cracked a joke about how this was no time to play “Sleeping Beauty” and if she wanted a kiss she could simply ask for it. Right now, he just needed to figure out where the hell they were or, more importantly, how to get back.

 

He scooped her up into his arms and began to walk across the rocky ground, fighting against the brutal wind at times as he went. Since nothing else was working, the first priority would be to find some shelter. It would be better for himself and Christine to find a place that was less exposed to the elements and… whatever else might be out there.

 

After all, he highly doubted that Dormammu had picked a  _ fun _ place for them to get lost.

 

It wasn’t long before he found a small cave that would be adequate. After a brief inspection to make sure nothing was living in there, he took Christine inside and set her down, with her back propped up against a wall. He just didn’t feel right about leaving her lying flat on the ground again.

 

He regretted the fact that he couldn’t build a fire. There was nothing around that resembled firewood or anything flammable, though perhaps that was for the best. It wasn’t all that cold, and fire might attract unwanted attention.

 

Eventually they would have to worry about food and water, but… one thing at a time.

 

A soft moan made his head snap back in Christine’s direction. She was waking up.

 

“Christine?” He was at her side instantly. “Christine, can you hear me?”

 

Her eyelids fluttered open. For a moment she appeared dazed, her eyes unfocused, but then she looked at him with clarity.

 

“Are you okay?” he asked her, reaching over to brush a stand of hair from her face.

 

She balked at his touch, flinching away. “Who are you?” She was looking at him suspiciously now, as one might regard a kidnapper.

 

Strange dropped his hand, baffled. “Christine, it’s me. Stephen.”

 

“Who?” She looked around the cave interior briefly. “Where the hell am I?”

 

“Hey, hey,” he gently took her shoulders when she tried to get up, “easy now, we still don’t know what happened to you.”

 

“Get your hands off me!” She grabbed at his wrists in an effort to throw him off. He withdrew his hands, only to prevent further agitation. “I don’t know you and I don’t know where the hell I am. What did you do to me?”

 

Strange sat back on his haunches, his brow furrowing. It would seem he now knew what Dormammu had done to her, apart from marooning both of them in some unknown realm where his magic wouldn’t work. She didn’t recognize him; she didn’t even remember him.

 

“Christine, do you know who  _ you _ are?” he asked, his physician side feeling it was important to test the extent of her amnesia. “What is the last thing you remember?”

 

That line of questioning seemed to calm her down marginally as she considered it. She seemed to respond better to someone who was approaching her as a doctor would; it seemed to assure her somewhat that he wasn’t just some kidnapper or rapist.

 

“I don’t know, everything’s kinda foggy,” she admitted after a moment, rubbing her temples warily. It seemed to hurt her just to think.

 

Strange had to stop himself from touching her. Right now, that wouldn’t comfort her in her current state and he needed to keep her calm. “What is your name?” he asked her. That would be a good place to start. “Your full name.”

 

She closed her eyes momentarily and took in a deep breath. When she opened them again she answered, “Christine Palmer.”

 

“What is your profession?” he gently pressed. “Where do you work?”

 

“Um... “ It took a moment for her to respond. “I’m a Doctor, I work at a hospital.”

 

Strange nodded, somewhat satisfied. She at least seemed to be aware of herself and her job. He even went as far as to ask her a couple of medical-related questions on how she would handle a couple of specific types of emergencies, which she answered readily.

 

That meant her memories in that area were intact. But…?

 

“You don’t remember me?” he asked. “Do you remember how we met?”

 

“I… don’t know you, I’m sorry,” Christine said, shaking her head.

 

“Do I seem familiar, at least?”

 

She stared at him harder and, for a moment, he  _ almost _ thought he saw the barest flicker of recognition in her eyes. It could have just been in his imagination or a trick of the light, though, for in the next instant she shook her head. “No, I don’t know you, sorry.”

 

Strange steepled his fingers before his face and drew in a deep breath, letting it out slowly. “Alright, we’ll leave that alone for now,” he said, temporarily resigning. “We need to work on finding a way out of here.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

 

Daytime and nighttime seemed relative, since the sky never changed color from its jet blackness. As time rolled by there seemed to be a moderate shift in the “feel” of the air, but for the most part everything stayed the same.

 

There was no sign of perspiration, there was hardly any fluctuation in the temperature and the only steady constant seemed to be that the wind continued to roar thunderously. At times it was almost powerful enough to nearly mow a grown person over, but for the most part it was just very annoying.

 

Christine was currently pacing the inside of the cave, her arms swinging freely at her sides as she moved. It was her way of keeping the blood flowing and working off some pent-off stress. It wasn’t like she could go out jogging or get a gym, after all; she and the tall man in the cape had agreed she should stay in here, for now.

 

He was currently out scouting and investigating the area, in an attempt to see what was out there (if anything) and, more importantly, to try and locate some food and water. This spot was relatively safe, at least for the moment, and he had said that he wouldn’t ask  _ any _ civilian to just wander around with him in an unknown realm without better escort.

 

Particularly one that he… cared about.

 

She frowned as she began to pace faster. What was it about him and this place, anyway? For the life of her, she just couldn’t remember him. She knew enough through her psychology training about human behavior and body language to recognize when someone seemed to be familiar  _ of _ her. The guy didn’t give off any creepy vibes and he seemed to be honest enough, so…

 

Frankly, nothing about the entire situation made any sense. He had flat out told her that they were apparently on a different planet or something like that, but… how? This didn’t seem like Mars or Saturn, and she knew enough from her grade school science lessons to know that she would have died instantly in  _ those _ atmospheres anyway.

 

Yet all of this seemed too real to be a dream, and… she still seemed a bit too lucid and self-aware to be insane. Plus the fact that she could still  _ ask _ if she was insane was a clear indicator that she wasn’t.

 

The sound of footsteps broke her out of her reverie, accompanied with slightly disturbed pebbles falling from the cave entrance as he returned. The tapping of the pebbles were mostly muffled as another gush of wind blew across the cave entrance, momentarily deafening them both.

 

“Did you find anything?” Christine asked once the wind died down a tad, though she still had to speak up just to be heard.

 

“No,” Strange said, also raising his voice. “There is just  _ nothing _ out there.” He made a helpless gesture with his hands. “There’s no food, no water, there’s no signs of life here,  _ nothing. _ There is just endless  _ rock _ in every direction, I don’t even see any patches of dirt or soil.”

 

Christine folded her arms as she glanced around at the cave walls and floor in contemplation. This was a really weird situation, way outside of her realm of expertise. There was  _ nothing _ she could suggest. Surgical procedures and broken bones,  _ that _ she could deal with if she had to right now. Not being in a weird place away from Earth that couldn’t support human life apart from having breathable air.

 

That… made something occur to her. “We can breathe the air here,” she said. “Doesn’t that mean this place  _ should _ be able to sustain life?”

 

Strange looked thoughtful. “Yeah, I’ve been thinking about that, too,” he said. “This place is…  _ odd. _ There is no flora and fauna, and yet we are able to breathe the air.”

 

He glanced around the cave briefly. “Plus caves usually form due to the presence of water wearing away rock over time, yet there is still no sign of water.”

 

“It almost sounds like this place is a prank,” Christine remarked.

 

Strange pursed his lips, taking her comment seriously for a moment. There might be more to that simple statement than originally thought. If Dormammu was trying to pull something, even if it was just a trick, maybe the entity was trolling them a bit. This place could even be an artificially constructed environment, created to allow them to survive after being dropped into it, but not to live long-term.

 

“Come on,” Strange said, “I think it’s time for us to leave here.”

 

“W-we’re going  _ out there? _ ” Christine gasped softly, her eyes widening. She was good in tense situations at a hospital, but not in this.

 

This was just way too much weirdness for her.

 

“We can’t stay here,” Strange told her. “There’s nothing around here for us to live on and, as far as I can tell, there’s nothing dangerous out there. Only the wind. There have been no weather changes so far, so we don’t need shelter.” He shrugged.

 

“Are you sure it’s safe out there?” Even if there was somehow a familiarity about him, she wasn’t sure if she wanted to set foot out there with someone she could not remember.

 

“It seems to be.” Strange held out a hand to her. “If we’re gonna survive, we need to take a chance. Will you trust me?”

 

She regarded him for a long moment and, seeing no reason not to and seeing the logic he presented, she slowly accepted his hand.

 

With that, the two of them stepped out of the cave together, hand-in-hand, with the brutal winds slapping at his Cloak and her scrubs. Together, they set forth to face the unknown.

 

“This place almost reminds me of the Phantom Zone or something,” Christine muttered at one point, but her words were lost in the wind.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

 

Christine had first noticed that something was “off” about the man’s hands when she first touched it.

 

In truth, if this had been  _ anywhere _ on Earth, she would never have agreed to hold hands with someone she felt she barely knew. These were not normal circumstances, however, plus maybe… something about his hands sparked some professional curiosity.

 

She needed  _ something _ to focus on that would keep her mind off of the uncertainty and weirdness all around her, after all. Otherwise she might have a panic attack.

 

“What happened to your hands?” she asked, when the howling wind died down enough for normal conversation to be heard.

 

Strange opened his mouth, then closed it. So… that meant she didn’t remember  _ anything _ about him, not even his accident or anything that took place afterward. 

 

For a brief moment, he felt a small burst of relief and pleasure. It meant that she did not recall the time when he was a complete asshole to her, soon before he left the United States to visit Tama Kanji.

 

Any spark of happiness on that note died in the next instant, however. It only meant that, while she didn’t remember the bad, she also didn’t remember the  _ good. _ Both brands of memories and experiences were vital to any long-lasting relationship, particularly when it managed to weather the storms.

 

“I was in an accident a few months ago,” he told her, his voice steady. It was a bit odd, how he could now speak of it as if it happened to a completely different person, years ago. “I suffered permanent nerve damage to both my hands.” 

 

He felt her fingers briefly brushing over his scarred skin, as if confirming his words through touch in her mind’s eye. “That must have been hard,” she said after a moment.

 

“Yeah, well, I had to quit my job,” Strange said, “but I ended up finding a new and better job.”

 

“As a Wizard?”

 

“Guilty is charged. Though we prefer the term ‘Master of Mystic Arts’.”

 

“I.. like ‘Wizard’ better. It’s easier to remember.”

 

“Fair enough.”

 

They fell silent again as another gush of wind picked up, this time blowing a cloud of dust and pebbles into their faces. This planet still showed no signs of having soil that could support life, but it seemed to have plenty of shattered, crushed and crumbled stone pieces.

 

“You don’t have any idea where we’re going, do you?” Christine stated, once the wind died down again.

 

Strange, detecting that she might be nearing panic-mode, squeezed her hand. Since he was still a relative stranger to her, however, that didn’t seem to do much to calm her. “No, do you?”

 

The point was made, but also caused her to look around more anxiously. “Are you telling me that we could keep walking in this direction forever and find  _ nothing? _ ” Her voice cracked.

 

“I am hoping that we will walk for a while in this direction and find  _ something, _ ” he told her. “Water, food, or hopefully some way out of here.”

 

She stopped walking and turned to face him, looking up at him. “Then shouldn’t we go back to the place where we started?” she asked. “There was a door there or something, wasn’t there? Maybe we can find it again.”

 

“It wasn’t a door, it was a portal--”

 

“Whatever. Can’t we go back and find it?”

 

“No, because  _ I _ made the portal and now it’s gone.”

 

Christine blinked, trying to make sense of that. “You made a portal? You mean  _ you _ brought us here?”

 

“No, Dormammu brought us here.”

 

“What the hell is a Dormumau?!”

 

“That’s  _ Dormammu, _ and that is a long story. I was trying to take you back to where I live and work, after you fell unconscious at the hospital.”

 

Now Christine ripped her hand out of his and took a couple of steps back. “You mean I was sick at the hospital and you took me  _ away _ from there? Why?”

 

“Because I was worried that Dormammu did something to you that only a Wizard could fix! And he  _ did. _ He gave you selective amnesia.”

 

“That  _ still _ sounds like something medical science could help with!” Christine shrieked. “I still don’t know who you are or what kind or weirdo you are, but you had  _ no right _ to just take me without my consent!”

 

“I didn’t have a choice! I didn’t know what else to do!”

 

“You could have taken me to one of the doctors instead! They were  _ right there.” _

 

“Christine, I  _ am _ a Doctor, and a damn good one! I am also a Master of the Mystic Arts, which means  _ I’m _ better qualified to help you in the case like this!”

 

“Oh yeah, you’re doing a  _ great _ job. I don’t know how you did it, but you got us  _ stuck _ here where we might die from thirst!”

 

“I did  _ not _ strand us here, Dormammu did!”

 

_ “Whatever.” _ Christine threw up her hands and took several deep breaths, attempting to calm herself.

 

The wind had stopped completely now, leaving the flat landscape of endless rock eerily still and silent. The sky maintained its blackness, still barren of any stars or clouds. Apart from the rocks and the air, they seemed to be the only things here… literally.

 

“Come on, the least we can do is keep moving,” Strange finally said.

 

“First, I have to pee,” Christine sighed, looking around. She did see a convenient boulder a few paces away that would give adequate privacy, but… 

 

She sighed. This was one of the very few times she envied men, just for having the more convenient part when it came to situations like this. It was almost as bad as when she was ten years old, when she, her dad and her brothers went on a long road trip together. With the nearest rest top more than fifty miles away, they had stopped at a small wooded area, which had been good enough for the guys.

 

She, however, just couldn’t bring herself to go, not without toilet paper and not without a… well, comfortable spot to sit. This had lead to her squirming in her seat, waiting out the long car ride until they  _ finally _ reached a gas station, feeling like her bladder might bust.

 

In this case, she was grown enough to where she wasn’t the same squeamish child; she could do without toilet paper or a sink to wash up in, at least for now. But…

 

“You stay here and don’t peek,” she snapped at him, marching toward the boulder. He dutifully turned his back on her as she checked her pockets. Good, she still had some napkins that she had stuffed into her scrubs earlier, at least.

 

When she reached the rock, she took one last look toward Strange to make certain he wasn’t looking. His back was still turned to her, but… judging from the position of his hands, it looked like he might have been relieving himself, too.

 

His Cloak spread out to block the view when she stared a moment too long, causing her to blink and turn away. She sat on the ground and prepared to do her best.

 

One thing was for certain. They were  _ not _ going to hold hands again for the rest of this… outing.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**

 

Both of them had been walking side by side for several minutes in silence, but it eventually reached the point where they had to break it. One couldn’t simply walk quietly forever in  _ this _ tense situation without saying anything.

 

“So… you were a Doctor before you became a Wizard?”

 

“Yeah,” Strange said. Neither of them looked at the other as they walked. They were more focused on the ground in front of them, which spanned off into a horizon that seemed to be eaten up by the black sky itself. “I was a damn good surgeon until the accident.”

 

“You picked a pretty weird change of career.”

 

“Well, it wasn’t my idea to stay,” he told her. “Not at first. I only went there to get my hands healed.”

 

_ Now _ she turned her head to gawk at him. “Oh, so you joined some kind of cult and expected them to fix whatever you think is wrong with me?”

 

“It’s… not a cult.” Strange winced briefly. They’d had this conversation once before, sort of. “For the record, they needed my help to stop Dormammu from taking the Earth. And Dormammu didn’t like that very much, so…” He spread his arms to indicate the space around them. “Here we are.”

 

“Okay,  _ who _ or  _ what _ is Dormammu?” 

 

“He’s… well, he’s not human.”

 

“Then what is he? A gorilla?”

 

“No, I mean he’s extraterrestrial.” 

 

“An  _ alien? _ ” Christine scoffed in disbelief.

 

Strange made another sweeping gesture. “We’re on an alien world right now, and Dormammu put us here.”

 

“So you pissed off this… alien, and that’s why he did this to us?” Christine blinked. “That’s why he put us here?”

 

“I only pissed him off because I wouldn’t let him take the Earth. He agreed to leave the Earth and the human race alone, but… he apparently threw in a curveball because he couldn’t be a good sport about it.”

 

“So this is his way of getting even? What’s the point?”

 

“Well, I don’t know yet. Dormammu and I haven’t exactly been on speaking terms since he left, so I can’t ask him what was thinking when he made all of this or put us here.”

 

Christine ran her fingers through her hair in exasperation. When she suddenly remembered she had not been able to properly wash her hands, she quickly dropped them to her sides and held them away from her body.

 

“Look, I can’t  _ deal _ with this. You  _ need _ to find a way to get us out of here, or call up this Dormammu, or  _ something. _ ”

 

“I don’t know how or if I even can!” Strange snapped. “I am doing my  _ best _ here Christine, and I  _ need _ you to trust me!”

 

“Well I  _ don’t _ trust you!” she shot right back. “All you’ve done so far is tell me that you’ve  _ kidnapped _ me from the hospital where I work, to this crappy place, telling me stories about some alien who wanted to eat the Earth or something! I don’t even know  _ who you are!” _

 

“That is because  _ Dormammu messed with your memory!” _

 

“Says  _ you, _ ” Christine snapped. “Sorry, bub, but I don’t know you from Adam. Maybe you’re  _ working  _ for Dormammu right now and this is some kind of sick human experiment or something! ‘Oh, let’s see how the scared little human female reacts under stress in this weird environment!”

 

“Christine--!”

 

“No I’m  _ not _ going to be your or anyone else’s lab rat!” She turned on her heel and began to stalk away, headed back in the direction from which they originally came.

 

“Where the hell are you going, Christine?” Strange called after her.

 

“I’m going back to the place where all this started!” she yelled over her shoulder, without stopping. “I’ll find my  _ own _ way back!”

 

For a moment, Strange was at a loss. To be fair, she didn’t know him, not in her current state. Could he really expect her to trust him or follow him blindly in this case? On top of that, he couldn’t even guarantee that they  _ would _ find water or any way out of here anytime soon. One could clearly see just by looking around that the flat, barren wasteland of dull gray rock continued endlessly in all directions.

 

Part of him felt like he should just press on anyway. Exploring more of the world might lead to  _ something _ different, or some kind of answer. If she wanted to be stubborn, well… at least there was nothing back that way that could hurt her anyway, right?

 

Then again… 

 

Something about her comments stuck in his mind.

 

_ Lab Rats. _

 

_ How humans do in this environment… _

 

What if that was it? 

 

Maybe that was the whole point of Dormammu’s revenge. He wanted Strange and his significant other to be at each other’s throats, in a situation where they would just wander around endlessly with no hope in sight.

 

Until what, they died of thirst? Somehow, Strange wasn’t sure if it would be  _ that _ simple.

 

But maybe it  _ would _ be a good idea to go back to their starting point. Maybe there was something there that he missed before. If nothing else, if they went back to their origin point and just sat around, maybe Dormammu would get bored, if he was watching any of this for his own amusement.

 

Whether or not that would provoke the entity to  _ speak _ to them was anyone’s guess, but… right now, what did they have to lose?

 

“Christine, wait up,” Strange called after her, running to catch up.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

 

It proved to be more difficult to find the exact spot where they’d started out than originally anticipated. Christine realized that she had no way of recognizing it; she had been unconscious at the time when they came out of the portal… or whatever.

 

They were able to use the cave they had stayed in briefly as a landmark, from which Dr. Strange made his best guess. The problem with there being no dirt, sand, barely even any dust on this planet was that they made little or no imprints on the ground of solid rock.

 

Eventually, they stopped in the area that  _ seemed _ like the closest proximity to where they’d started, but it was still hard to tell. Both of them made a sweep of the area, trying to see if there were any clues or  _ anything _ whatsoever that might be useful, but…  _ nothing. _

 

For all intents and purposes, Strange had to accept that his portal had been hijacked and redirected somehow, and now his magic wouldn’t work. He did try  _ one _ more time to form a portal, but his attempts fell flat.

 

Christine wasn’t really talking to him now. She continued to stalk across and around the entire area, as though looking for  _ something _ with the intensity of a person who’d lost their most expensive ring.

 

Strange knew that she was still angry at him, and for the moment the best thing to do would be to let her get it out of her system. She wouldn’t be satisfied until she looked around thoroughly and gave up on her own. In a way, he would be disappointed if she blindly accepted anything that he told her anyway, especially since… right now, he was a stranger to her.

 

He was currently hovering about a meter off the ground in a meditative pose, his legs folded neatly and his Cloak hanging down from behind, almost touching the rock below. He kept a portion of his attention open to his surroundings, particularly Christine, just in case any danger appeared or anything unexpected happened.

 

That seemed unlikely in this vastness of… nothing, but he couldn’t afford to let down his guard.

 

At one point, he caught Christine gawking at him with a very weirded out expression. Of course, from her perspective, she hadn’t seen him and his Cloak do this or anything like it before. Eventually she stopped staring though, returning her efforts to stubbornly searching the area.

 

Strange was trying to see if there was  _ anything _ else that he could do. It had occurred to him just now that yes, he couldn’t make portals, but… surely magic could still work here, right? His Cloak hadn’t been rendered inert.

 

A hearty, exasperated sigh caught his attention. Christine had apparently given up on her efforts and plunked herself on the ground a few meters away from him. Her knees were up and she had wrapped her arms around them. She wasn’t quite rocking herself for comfort, but she appeared close to doing so.

 

The Wizard felt his chest constrict a tad when he noticed her like this. Normally, this would be  _ exactly _ the moment he would go over there and try to comfort her. Under these circumstances… he just couldn’t.

 

_ We’re gonna need food and water, soon, _ his brain reminded him again. Not to mention both of them would need sleep. 

 

Sleep…?

 

That gave him an idea.

 

“Make sure nothing happens to my body,” he murmured to his Cloak, and literally kicked out of his own body with his astral form. Behind him, the Cloak gingerly lowered his body to the ground, laying him on his side and draping over him almost protectively.

 

This would be a bit risky, particularly since there was only so much the Cloak could do, but… it was a chance he had to take. They weren’t getting anything done they way they were trying to do things before.

 

His astral form breezed toward his sole companion on this world as if lighter than the air itself, and he spoke softly beside her. “Christine?”

 

Her first reaction was to start and glare in annoyance at his unannounced, uninvited close proximity and violation of her personal space.

 

In the next instant, she screamed. When her eyes shot over to his unmoving body on the ground nearby, she screamed again, even louder. One of the most blood-curdling sounds a human was capable of making had exploded from her mouth.

 

“Y-you’re a ghost! You’re not even real!” Christine was obviously on the verge of hysteria now, possibly a meltdown of some kind.

 

Strange hadn’t anticipated her reaction to be  _ this _ bad, but he regretted not seeing it coming. She’d literally had every freaky thing imagineable happen to her today, with no prior experience to cope with it, not to mention she still didn’t remember him. The circumstances and his Mystical gifts were not making it any easier to win her trust; he was probably becoming more and more alien to her. 

 

“Christine,” he said, trying to get through to her, “I--”

 

She was no longer listening. She leaped to her feet and began to run as quickly as her legs would carry her.

 

“Christine, WAIT!” Strange immediately flew after her. “Christine, listen to me!”

 

When she didn’t stop, he knew the only thing he could do was to keep following her until she  _ did _ stop. He hated the way she was going to wear her body out though, when they had to conserve energy.

 

Unless…

 

He made a bold move just then, diving right through the middle of her back and forcing her own astral form out of her body. He swerved around to check back at her then motionless form, finding that she had sprawled across the ground (thankfully, her head was cushioned from striking the barren rock with her own arm) and he turned his full attention to her astral form.

 

For a moment she appeared to be completely stunned, as this was her first literal out of body experience. She looked at him, she looked at herself, she noted how her feet were above the ground… and then she noticed her own body.

 

“OH MY GOD, YOU KILLED MY BODY,” she screamed.

 

_ “Shhh!” _ he took her by the shoulders, giving her a gentle shake. “It’s okay, your body is fine. This is your astral form.”

 

“What did you do to me?!” 

 

“Christine, this might be our only way out of here. I think we both may have to go  _ up _ ,” he indicated the inky black sky with his eyes, “and we can only do that in our astral forms… in case there isn’t any air up there.”

 

“But what about our bodies?!”

 

“We’ll come back for them later.”  _ I hope. _ He didn’t add that part aloud.

 

She still looked very, very freaked out, like everything around her was the epitome of insanity and she was the only sane thing left… and even that was slipping away now. If she wasn’t in her astral form, separate from her body, she probably would have been crying hysterically and hyperventilating. 

 

“Look, just come with me,” he urged her. “We will go up, look around, and if there is nothing there, I will take you back to your body. You will wake up like you never left. Please? Will you trust me?”

 

He didn’t want to stay away from their bodies too long anyway. It was important right now to stay in them. Their astral forms still relied on them to remain alive, and even if they stayed out searching forever, their bodies would still gradually deteriorate from lack of exercise and basic necessities.

 

“Please?” he pressed again, when she didn’t answer. He didn’t want to put  _ too _ much pressure on her, not wanting to send her into another frenzy, but… time was of the essence.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8**

 

_ “GET THE HELL AWAY FROM ME!” _

 

For the briefest of moments, Strange  _ almost _ thought he’d gotten through to her enough to join him, even on this insane… journey. Instead, she began to flail about, shrieking.

 

_ “Christine, _ please,” Strange shouted, not angrily but firmly. He ended up flowing around behind her and securing a solid grip around her wrists and pinned her against him. He grimaced and yelped when she managed to get a good kick in, though. Physical contact didn’t feel  _ quite _ the same in astral form, but it still felt uncomfortable.

 

The only thing he could do was tighten his grip and shove her astral form back into her fallen body. Once she was safely returned, she was momentarily disoriented, but then she gasped and pushed herself up off the ground, into a partial squat.

 

When he made his astral form visible to her human eyes, she gasped and scampered backward a full meter, scraping her palms lightly against the rocky ground.

 

Strange held up his hands in a non-threatening gesture. He even moved back a bit himself, trying to make it clear he wasn’t going to attack her or do anything else to her.

 

“I’m sorry,” he told her, once he was sure she wasn’t going to scoot off further or do anything else. For the moment, she seemed content to simply stare with the widest eyes he’d ever seen on her pretty features. “I shouldn’t have done that to you. I know all of this is pretty freaky for you.”

 

Her lips moved to form an incoherent sentence he did not understand. She cautiously got to her feet and rose to her full height, her eyes still as wide as dinner plates and her skin quite pale.

 

Strange realized at that moment just how much he  _ longed _ for her to be the Christine he remembered again. He desperately wanted to hear her call him “Stephen”, to tell him that despite all of this, she  _ would _ trust him enough to go along with this, to follow his lead.

 

Then again… would there even be any  _ reason _ for her to, even if she did have her memories back? He had no idea what he was even doing here, not in this situation. He had no way to call for backup, he couldn’t even inform the Inner Sanctum that he’d been waylaid or what had happened. The best he could hope for was that they would assume he was missing after a time, but… 

 

Even then, how would they know where to look?

 

“Christine…” Strange could only look at her helplessly. Was there  _ anything _ he could say to her?

 

In the next second, however, it turned out that it no longer mattered.

 

She fainted.

 

Strange winced empathically when he saw her head strike the ground and he immediately flew closer to take a look. She looked alright, her breathing was fine, and… there wasn’t much he could do in astral form anyway.

 

He concentrated, sticking his hand into her throat to check her pulse and the general “feel” of her brain. It took a lot of focus, not to mention practice, but he could literally detect the vibrations of a working brain and pulsing jugular,  and some of the textures of the tissues. When he finally removed his hands, he was moderately relieved that she might have a very mild concussion, but she was fine otherwise.

 

It just wouldn’t do for her to fall down on this rocky planet again.

 

However… he also figured that  _ now _ might be the best time to take off and go explore the area above. With his trusty Cloak guarding his body and… well, Christine temporarily unable to run off or do something careless, it seemed like now or never.

 

With one last wistful and apologetic look at Christine, he turned and launched his astral form upward, as fast and as high as he could go  _ quickly, _ for at least short-range, attempting to stay relatively parallel with her fallen form.

 

He had a feeling he was about to find out what was up there… if anything.


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9**

 

Dr. Strange flowed through the air until he reached the black layer of sky above his head. What shocked him was that, once he was closed enough, it seemed less like a “sky” and “layer” was the more fitting word. 

 

It turned out that it wasn’t really a sky at all. It was a solid thing, at least it seemed that way. He could put his hands through it and they disappeared from sight for a moment, as though he were penetrating a ceiling.

 

_ Huh, I guess I should’ve known something was off when there were no stars, _ he thought as he pulled his arms back toward him. Though of course, there was no way of telling sometimes what rules applied to other worlds or realms. He had once been to at least one realm where stars were nonexistent.

 

Very cautiously, he took a chance and moved the entire upper half of his astral form through the ceiling of the world, or whatever it was, in order to get a better look. 

 

What happened next, happened fast. It was also the very last thing that he expected would happen, and it would even take him a little time afterward to process just  _ what _ happened.

 

_ “So you are trying to escape from the area I have placed you?” _ thundered a deep, booming voice that definitely wasn’t human.  _ “Very well, consider your premature departure an escape. But just TRY to escape from the next zone I have in store for you.” _

 

“Dormammu…” The name had barely passed Dr. Strange’s lips when literally everything changed.

 

The first thing he noticed was that his astral form was somehow back in his own body, even though he didn’t remember actually going back. The second thing he noticed was that Christine’s still form was right beside him, flat on her back. She was just as unconscious as before.

 

Strange realized he was also lying flat on his back. He quickly pushed himself up into more of a crouch, looking around quickly. He didn’t want to remain in a vulnerable position while in an unknown place. 

 

They were definitely in a very different kind of place now. It was a room rather than a wide open space of air and endless rocky ground. This space was probably about the size of a typical large house, if it had no walls or doors to segment the rooms. There appeared to be  _ nothing _ here either, except for dark beige walls engraved with symbols he did not recognize.

 

The space was also well-lighted. A glance up at the ceiling revealed an other-worldly light source, one that somehow resembled a lamp but also something a bit more… organic? It almost looked like a huge scepter had been stuck most of the way into the ceiling, leaving the glowing orb at the top to hang down like a hanging light source to illuminate the room.

 

Once he was finished surveying the room and was fairly certain there was no immediate danger, he turned his attention back to Christine. He examined her and found that she seemed alright, though she would probably have a headache when she awoke.

 

“Christine?” He stroked her cheek with the back of one hand, peering at her closely for any sign of response. “Christine, can you hear me?”

 

There was a soft sound amidst her breathing, like someone might make when they were being spoken to in a deep sleep. She didn’t appear quite ready to come around yet, so he left her alone.

 

He sat back on his haunches for a moment, taking another moment to look around the huge room. It was very obvious that Dormammu was playing a game with both of them, though he was the one that the entity  _ really _ wanted to toy with.

 

That gave him an idea.

 

“DORMAMMU!” he bellowed, looking up toward the ceiling as he got to his feet. “I know you’re watching! If you want to keep playing this game, fine, but leave her out of it! Send her home,  _ now. _ ”

 

There was no response.

 

Strange opened his mouth, but quickly closed it. Who was he really kidding here? He had no bargaining chip whatsoever in this situation, and he already knew how damn stubborn Dormammu could be. Strange had literally been killed by the deity many times before the evil creature would finally listen to his proposal.

 

“What’s your game, Dormammu?!” he demanded into the air, though he might as well have been speaking to the light source in the ceiling. He  _ knew _ that the evil creature was both listening and watching, and he also knew that Dormammu knew.

 

_ He’s taunting me, _ Strange realized.  _ This is a situation where HE has the upper hand instead, unlike before when I trapped him in a time loop. He likes holding that over me. _

 

After one more quick look at Christine to make sure she seemed alright, he moved closer to one of the walls to begin examining the odd symbols engraved there.

 

That’s when he realized those weren’t engraved. They were actually more like… pressure points? All you had to do was touch them and they would descend about three inches into the wall. 

 

After a bit of experimenting, Strange realized that he could apply pressure to any of the blocks on the wall that contained a symbol, in any order. However, once they were all pressed in, they would all return to their original positions in unison with a collective scraping noise that grated on the nerves.

 

_ So am I in a room full of big buttons? _ Strange wondered. That seemed to be the case, although he didn’t have any idea what they were supposed to do or what sequence he was supposed to press them. He was starting to feel a little like Indiana Jones, stuck in a place where a wall needed to be manipulated with a specific sequence.

 

Yet there was also no sign of a door, or… anything.

 

Upon further exploration, he realized that each of the four walls had at least a dozen and six of these odd pressure blocks, yet… there was one interesting distinction he noticed. Each wall seemed to operate separately from each of the others. If he pushed in some of the pressure points on one of the walls and then switched to another, it appeared to have no effect on anything. Each wall was independent, only caring about what sequence all of its own pressure points were pressed.

 

_ Great, _ he thought with exasperation. As if this entire situation wasn’t hopeless enough, now he would need to figure out four different combination locks to get anywhere.

 

Unless he decided not to play Dormammu’s game anymore, but… what choice did he have? He was trapped in here, his magic still wasn’t working, and he was being forced to either play the game or do nothing.

 

And there was still Christine to worry about.

 

For a moment, he could only sit on the floor next to her and run his hands warily through his hair. What was he going to do? How was he going to figure this out?


End file.
